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Chapter 16 Project planning and control 481<br />

Figure 16.19 New logistics operation: precedence network<br />

Programme evaluation and review technique (PERT)<br />

The programme evaluation and review technique, or PERT as it is universally known, had<br />

its origins in planning and controlling major defence projects in the US Navy. PERT had its<br />

most spectacular gains in the highly uncertain environment of space and defence projects.<br />

The technique recognizes that activity durations and costs in project management are not<br />

deterministic (fixed), and that probability theory can be applied to estimates, as was mentioned<br />

earlier. In this type of network each activity duration is estimated on an optimistic, a<br />

most likely and a pessimistic basis, as shown in Figure 16.20. If it is assumed that these time<br />

estimates are consistent with a beta probability distribution, the mean and variance of the<br />

distribution can be estimated as follows:<br />

where<br />

t e =<br />

t e = the expected time for the activity<br />

t o = the optimistic time for the activity<br />

t l = the most likely time for the activity<br />

t p = the pessimistic time for the activity.<br />

t o + 4t l + t p<br />

6

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